Written Answers Tuesday 22 June 2010

Scottish Executive

Civil Servants

Derek Brownlee (South of Scotland) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question to S3W-34268 by John Swinney on 8 June 2010, whether any civil servants were eligible to receive a bonus for reducing the cost of public services without affecting service outcomes in the last financial year for which figures are available.

John Swinney: I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-34268 on 16 June 2010. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx .

NHS Hospitals

Nanette Milne (North East Scotland) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive how many parking fines have been issued on hospital premises in each year since 1999, broken down by (a) NHS board and (b) hospital.

Nanette Milne (North East Scotland) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive how many parking fines have been collected by NHS boards in each year since 1999.

Nicola Sturgeon: NHS boards, as with other private landowners, are not able to issue parking fines on their property.

  However, there are civil remedies which are open to NHS boards to control the use of their land, including car parks. Accordingly, in a number of NHS boards, where conditions of car park use are breached, an unauthorised parking notice will be issued and any follow up action pursued as a civil matter.

  Information on the number of unauthorised parking notices issued or collected is not held centrally.

Police

Bill Kidd (Glasgow) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive how many assaults on police officers have been reported in the last 10 years, broken down by police force.

Kenny MacAskill: The information requested is given in tables 1 and 3 of Assaults on police officers and other emergency workers, in Scotland, 1999-00 to 2008-09 published by the Scottish Government in June 2010, a copy of which is available in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 50564).

Police

Richard Baker (North East Scotland) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-33972 by Kenny MacAskill on 8 June 2010, how many whole-time equivalent police support staff were employed in each police force on 31 March (a) 2007, (b) 2008 and (c) 2009.

Kenny MacAskill: The numbers of police support staff employed in each force at 31 March in each of the years are shown in the following table.

  

 
2007
2008
2009


Central
386
353
335


Dumfries and Galloway
262
264
252


Fife
526
477
522


Grampian
780
759
720


Lothian and Borders
1,335
1,265
1,211


Northern
383
366
355


Strathclyde
3,046
2,632
2,536


Tayside
634
509
509


SPSA and SCDEA
 
886
1,326


Total
7,352
7,511
7,766



  Source: Quarterly Strength Returns from forces and annual figures from SPSA.

Procurement

Johann Lamont (Glasgow Pollok) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-33970 by John Swinney on 9 June 2010, whether it will list the contracts that it has entered into that do not make specific reference to contractors complying with the national minimum wage.

John Swinney: There is currently no central list of contracts and the conditions they contain that would enable us to provide this information. However, framework agreements awarded by the Central Government Centre of Procurement Expertise, which is part of the Scottish Government’s Procurement Directorate, usually include a clause requiring that contractors comply with legislation, including the national minimum wage and, where appropriate, TUPE. These frameworks can be used by the core Scottish Government, its agencies and non-departmental public bodies.

Procurement

Johann Lamont (Glasgow Pollok) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has considered making the living wage a requirement of its procurement practices.

John Swinney: Contractors to the Scottish Government are usually required to demonstrate that they comply with their legal obligations, including obligations relating to employment law and that they are suitable to be awarded a contract. Subject to compliance with relevant legal obligations, a contactor’s relationship with its staff is a matter for the contractor not the purchaser. Imposing a requirement for the payment of a minimum level of wage in the context of any particular procurement process may amount to a restriction of freedom to provide services and could therefore be in breach of EU law.

Procurement

James Kelly (Glasgow Rutherglen) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive when the intelligence-sharing service for public sector agencies to determine suitability of potential contractors that is being considered by the Serious Organised Crime and Procurement Sub Group will be operational and how it will operate.

Kenny MacAskill: The Scottish Intelligence and Co-ordination Unit (SICU) has now been established and will become the recognised single point for the co-ordination and sharing of intelligence and information on serious organised crime groups across Scotland.

  In addition to the work of the SICU, individual police forces across Scotland are working closely with individual local authorities to assist them in ensuring that they are minimising their risk of exposure to organised crime groups when seeking potential contractors.

  The Scottish Government itself is firmly committed to ensuring that public contracts are awarded to legitimate businesses and has made it a condition of contract that those providing private security services directly or indirectly to it achieve Approved Contractor Status from the Security Industry Authority. The authority is the body responsible for regulating the private security industry across the UK, and must be satisfied that a company and its directors meet its fit and proper organisation/person tests before conferring Approved Contractor Status on a company. We have also communicated this across the wider public sector in Scotland with a view to encouraging other public bodies to adopt this policy.

Procurement

James Kelly (Glasgow Rutherglen) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive when the Serious Organised Crime and Procurement Sub Group will report on the sectors of public procurement that are most vulnerable to exploitation by serious and organised crime groups.

Kenny MacAskill: The Serious Organised Crime and Procurement Sub Group provides regular progress updates to both the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and to the Serious Organised Crime Taskforce.

  Initial collaborative work has been undertaken between the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency and the Scottish Procurement Directorate to assist with the identification of those sectors of public procurement which are most vulnerable to exploitation by Serious Organised Crime Groups. This initial work still requires further development and the findings from this work will be reported once they are available.

  In addition to this ongoing work, the SOC Taskforce "Information and Research Plan" includes work to develop our longer term understanding of how to better assess the vulnerability of business sectors to infiltration by Serious Organised Crime Groups drawing on methods and evidence from other jurisdictions.

Procurement

James Kelly (Glasgow Rutherglen) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive what progress the Serious Organised Crime and Procurement Sub Group has made in scoping the feasibility of automating the validation process for previous convictions, in relation to which information is sought in the pre-qualification questionnaire for public contracts.

Kenny MacAskill: Work is currently ongoing to identify a method of linking the e-Procurement and Criminal History databases in a way that is both secure and appropriately transparent. In addition to this work, representatives of the Serious Organised Crime and Procurement Sub Group are planning to meet with members of the Dutch authorities to share best practice and learn from their experiences of the administrative approach that they have adopted in relation to serious organised crime and public sector procurement in the Netherlands.

Procurement

James Kelly (Glasgow Rutherglen) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive what action it can take in addition to the work being undertaken by the Serious Organised Crime and Procurement Sub Group to limit public sector contracts being exploited by serious and organised crime groups.

Kenny MacAskill: The Serious Organised Crime and Procurement Sub-group is leading the work to limit access to public sector contracts from organised crime groups.

  In addition to this work, there are a number of other initiatives being taken forward under the "Deter" strand of the Serious Organised Crime Strategy to help businesses and local authorities to protect themselves from becoming victims of serious organised crime through enhanced collaboration and information exchange.

  These initiatives include a range of presentations being delivered by the SCDEA Interventions team to COSLA, local authorities and business organisations aimed at increasing awareness and reducing the threat to legitimate business from serious organised crime. Strathclyde Police are also in the process of signing a number of information sharing agreements with the local authorities within their force area to improve information flow around organised crime groups and their ability to target the public sector.

  The Serious Organised Crime Taskforce will keep these issues under review, to ensure that we are continually improving our ability to increase awareness across Scotland and prevent public sector contracts being awarded to organised crime groups.

Public Appointments

Andy Kerr (East Kilbride) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will list the (a) appointments that have been made to public bodies by ministers since May 2007 and (b) political affiliation, where known, of the appointees.

Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will list the (a) appointments that were made to public bodies by ministers from 1999 until May 2007 and (b) political affiliation, where known, of the appointees.

John Swinney: The Scottish Government does not hold this information. Information relating to board membership details of the public bodies which are regulated by the Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland are shown on the Scottish Government’s public appointments website – http://www.appointed-for-scotland.org/About-public-bodies/NDPB-Directory/ . The directory does not hold details of any past appointments.

Public Appointments

John Wilson (Central Scotland) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive how much has been received in remuneration by persons serving on the boards and committees of quangos, broken down by (a) job title and (b) individual payments to (i) directors and (ii) non-executive directors since 2006.

John Swinney: I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-33936 on 8 June 2010. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx .

Schools

Nanette Milne (North East Scotland) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive how many local authorities have provided free water to pupils in (a) secondary and (b) primary schools in each year since 1999.

Adam Ingram: The following table sets out the information requested from 2004 to 2009. Data is not available for the years 1999 to 2003.

  

Year
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009


Primary
31
32
32
32
32
32


Secondary
30
31
31
32
32
32

Scottish Enterprise

Pauline McNeill (Glasgow Kelvin) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive what Scottish Enterprise posts have been removed through voluntary redundancies in the last year; what severance packages were available for affected staff, and what the cost was of each package paid.

Jim Mather: Voluntary severance programmes and related costs are operational matters for Scottish Enterprise.

  I will ask its chief executive to write to you.

Scottish Futures Trust

Bill Butler (Glasgow Anniesland) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive how much it will spend on the Scottish Futures Trust in 2010-11.

John Swinney: The budget line for the Scottish Futures Trust (SFT) approved by the Scottish Parliament in the 2010-11 Budget is £5.9 million.

Scottish Government

Jeremy Purvis (Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale) (LD): To ask the Scottish Executive for what reason the monthly agenda and minutes of its Strategic Board have not been published on its website since the meeting held on 15 October 2009.

John Swinney: The agenda and minutes of the monthly Strategic Board meetings from November 2009 to February 2010 have now been published on the Scottish Government website. This is in line with the government’s commitment contained in its publication scheme and which can be viewed online at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/About/FOI/19260 .

Waste Management

Sarah Boyack (Edinburgh Central) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive how much food waste it disposes of annually.

John Swinney: Information on waste arisings is detailed in the Scottish Government Environmental Performance: Annual Report 2008-09 , published on 21 May 2010. Copies of the report are available from the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 50874).

  Figures in respect of food waste are not held as it is not currently possible to disaggregate volumes of food waste that are included within the general waste stream. We will be holding discussions with our new waste management contractor shortly to see what improvements can be made to the waste data that we receive. Additionally a six month pilot project will shortly begin at Victoria Quay to assess the feasibility of removing food and other suitable wastes from the general waste stream for composting. If successful the initiative will enable a reduction in our waste arisings being sent to landfill in line with the Zero Waste Plan.